MVD Entertainment Group furthers the distribution of Arrow Video in the US with four new titles…

Nikkatsu Diamond Guys – Vol 1 [Blu-ray + DVD] coming January 26

Limited edition of 3000 copies!

Nikkatsu, the oldest film studio in Japan, inaugurated a star system in the late 1950s, finding talent and contracting to their Diamond Line for a series of wild genre pictures. This collection celebrates these “Diamond Guys” with three classic films from directors Seijun Suzuki (Branded to Kill), Toshio Masuda (Rusty Knife) and Buichi Saito (Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart in Peril).

An old hand at tough guy action roles, Hideaki Nitani (Tokyo Drifter, Massacre Gun) stars in Suzuki’s Voice Without a Shadow. Asako, a former telephone operator once heard the voice of a murder suspect which has continued to haunt her. Years later her husband invites his boss, Hamazaki, over for dinner and she realises his voice is suspiciously like that of the killer. Before she can investigate further, Hamazaki is found dead and her husband becomes the prime suspect…

Next, 50s subculture icon Yujiro Ishihara (Crazed Fruit) stars in Masuda’s Red Pier as “Jiro the Lefty”, a killer with a natural talent. Shortly after arriving in Kobe, he witnesses a man die in a crane accident which turns out to be a cover-up for a murder. Jiro soon finds himself on the run, tailed by a determined cop…

Finally, in Saito’s The Rambling Guitarist, mega star Akira Koabyashi (Battles Without Honour and Humanity) stars as wandering street musician Shinji, who falls in with mob boss Akitsu after saving one of his henchmen in a bar fight. Tasked by Akitsu with evicting an offshore fishery, Shinji finds himself in the middle of a very unusual domestic dispute…

Presented on Blu-ray and DVD for the first time in the West, these thrilling genre films feature Nikkatsu’s leading talent at their best.

Bonus Materials

* High Definition digital transfers of all three films, from original film elements by Nikkatsu Corporation

Fresh off her career defining roles for Jack Hill in Coffy and Foxy Brown, Pam Grier continued her domination of the Blaxploitation genre, in cult filmmaker William Girdler’s (The Manitou, Abby) ‘Sheba, Baby’…

Grier plays Sheba Shayne, a private eye based in Chicago who is called to her hometown to stop the local mob boss (played by “that bad D’Urville Martin”, Black Caesar, Dolemite) from moving in on her father’s loan business. Aided by her father’s partner, Brick Williams (Austin Stoker, Assault on Precinct 13, Battle for the Planet of the Apes), Sheba finds out that the violent thugs aren’t going go away without a fight. Car bombs, gun fights and boat chases ensue whilst armed with her curves, street smarts and a .44, Sheba is in for a bloodbath!

Grier would appear in three Blaxploitation classics in 1975 (the others were Bucktown and Friday Foster), where she was at the top of her game and genre, with the Los Angeles Times calling her “cool, tough and glamorous – a female fantasy Wonder Woman”, further cementing her status as the first female action star.

Everyone knows the classic American horror titles: Night of the Living Dead, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and A Nightmare on Elm Street, to name but a few. But we want to tell you a different story: a story of the unsung heroes of stars-and-stripes terror, films that have remained on the fringes of the genre either through lack of availability or else sheer obscurity.This is where American Horror Project comes in.

Volume One of this series presents three tales of violence and madness from the 1970s. Malatesta’s Carnival of Blood (Christopher Speeth, 1973) sees a family arrive at a creepy, dilapidated fairground in search of their missing son, only tofind themselves at the mercy of the cannibalistic ghouls lurking beneath the park. Meanwhile, The Witch Who Came from the Sea (Matt Cimber, 1976), stars Millie Perkins (The Diary of Anne Frank) as a young woman whose bizarre and violentfantasies start to bleed into reality – literally. Lastly, every parent’s worst nightmare comes true in The Premonition (RobertAllen Schnitzer, 1976), a tale of psychic terror in which five-year-old Janie is snatched away by a strange woman claimingto be her long-lost mother.

Newly remastered from the best surviving elements and contextualised with brand new supplementary material, American Horror Project proudly presents an alternative history of American horror and film heritage.

LIMITED EDITION CONTENTS

*Brand new 2K restorations of the three features

*High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) and Standard DVD presentations

*Original Mono 1.0 audio (Uncompressed PCM on the Blu-rays)

*English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing

*Reversible sleeves for each film featuring original and newly-commissioned artwork by the Twins of Evil